A man who raided a South Jordan mink farm says a prosecutor's statements
during an aborted sentencing hearing amount to a breach of his plea
agreement.

As a remedy, William James Viehl asked U.S. District Judge Dee Benson on
Thursday to remove himself from his case and reassign it to another
judge for the purpose of sentencing.

Viehl, 23, was expected to be sentenced Nov. 12 to six months in prison
for damaging and interfering with animal enterprises during a September
raid on the McMullin mink farm in South Jordan. Such a sentence is
consistent with the low end of the federal sentencing guidelines, which
the U.S. Attorney's Office had agreed to recommend in exchange for
Viehl's guilty plea.

During the sentencing hearing, however, prosecutor John Huber told
Benson that although Viehl's actions were classified as a property crime
by the sentencing guidelines, the impact of his misconduct was much more
sinister than simple vandalism.

"The crime itself was designed to intimidate and inspire fear in the
victims," Huber said.

Investigators believe Viehl and Alex Hall, 21, released as many as 650
minks in the raid and also vandalized a number of buildings on the
property with phrases such as "No More Mink, No More Murder" and "ALF:
We Are Watching."

"As you fashion your sentence today," Huber told Benson,
"the corollary is that your sentencing decision will have a
much broader impact than just on Mr. Viehl. ... Everyone is
listening to what you're doing."

Benson seemed to be swayed by the argument, saying that the case
involved "too much threat and terror."
"I can't be as lenient as six months. I'm inclined to go to two years,
maybe more," the judge said. "This sentence has got to be a deterrent, a
message sent to other people."

Defense attorney Heather Harris, in a motion filed Thursday, seized on
Huber's statements as evidence of the breach of her client's plea
agreement. She said the prosecutor "violated the plea agreement at
almost the very outset by complaining about the (sentencing)
guidelines."

"The government's presentation was not merely restating facts," Harris
wrote, "but was characterizing Mr. Viehl's conduct and the effects of
it."

Harris added that Huber's repeated warnings that "people are watching"
what kind of sentence Viehl received also constituted a "continued
breach of the agreement."

"The only conceivable purpose for the government's presentation was to
indirectly encourage the court to impose a sentence other than what the
government agreed to recommend," Harris wrote. "The effect of its
presentation was the equivalent of winking and nodding while uttering
the phrase 'low-end recommendation. ' "

A new sentencing hearing scheduled for Dec. 11 is likely to be
rescheduled in light of Harris' request for reassignment of the case. A
hearing on her request has not been scheduled.